INSEAD Blog by Zanat0s the INSEAD(er) @ Tokyo ! The Biggest among INSEAD MBA blogs. Insead is over, blogging not.

Singapore VS Tokyo Round 2!

Singapore VS Tokyo Nr2.

Having your blog syndicated on Facebook means one will receive more pair of eyes than he otherwise would. My last blog entry was about Tokyo nightlife and my disappointment with it. People here tend to believe or support that Tokyo Nightlife is great etc.

For the ones who read my blog on steady basis(I hope they are enough of you out there) you should read my opinion about subjective and objective views. I am not saying that I am right or wrong in my eyes and what I expect are different from other people. The things I value and the kind of night life I like won’t agree with everybody. If it did then there would be something wrong. Everyone is unique.

The values and characteristics are dissimilar among groups of people and that is the way it should be. So get ready for another bout of Tokyo bashing. One may thing that Tokyo is a big city it is! But at the same it is so small you cannot imagine. People do not like change, they like getting used to some things. One of them is going out to the same place over a period of time. The night life is extremely fake.

Tokyo defenders then use the same old argument that Singapore is boring, small and that is had no culture. The first argument is based on nothing but pure grumping moods. Singapore is not boring. There are a lot things one can enjoy very easily and accessible. Brunches in Singapore are a pleasure with world class food. Sentosa is a paradise on earth. I mean it is so close and people can go there and unwind on weekend as well as on weekdays. Clarke quay and boat quay are definitely NOT boring. Yes there are not a lot of places to go out but the quality and size are great. Moreover Singapore being very concentrated means these places are fool every day from Wednesday to Saturday. In Tokyo I still haven’t found good places where a lot of people go out on weekdays). So boring Singapore is not (hoho! That sounded like Yoda!).

The second is more difficult to refute; Singapore is small. But this is a blessing and a curse. For people like me who value convenience and efficiency it is great. I mean I normally do not travel within a country rather go for overseas travel. Therefore Singapore is great for me. On top of that Singapore-Thailand is faster than Tokyo-Narita. If one wants to go to the Narita Airport he has to take a train that takes exactly 95 minutes to the airport. Singapore – Thailand is less than 100 mins. Talk about wasted time.

Where I completely agree with my critics is the culture issue. Singapore + culture are 2 words that cannot appear together. Singapore has a 40 year history and they are starting to become a city of millionaires and neo rich. The population mix is mixed… Therefore the government tried to do the really unsuccessful campaign called Uniquely Singapore. What is unique? The sheer number of malls? But do not forget that Singapore is a new country. The culture will emerge( Singlish is something they are trying to preserve along with their craziness about food).

So here it was Tokyo  Vs Singapore = 1 – 2!  Let the rounds go on and on! As for me I am enjoying that. I need to grumble about something in public(since this is a public blog). Grumbling about Tokyo nightlife is safer than other acid subjects.

Getting a place in Singapore and in Fonty

First of all sorry for drooling of last night and living my post unfinished will try to do penance tonight. One odififcult part of INSEAD is getting accommodation, cheap and good accommodation. I will write 2 paragraphs, one for steps to do in Fonty and one for Singapore. My Singaporean will be more detailed since I went through that phase. I really cannot stress the importance of finding the right accommodation quickly. INSEAD could do more than just give information especially in Singapore.
In Fonty students have 3 choices. Chateaus, in Fonty or in an outside village. There are quite a lot of Chateaus around Fonty which are big enough for 10 or more students. There are different chateaus with distinctive characters. There are mostly the party places. The tenants organize either really big dinners or just parties during the weekend. The places require a maid most probably and one that can cook. The Chateaus vary in size some or more like old French castles which sometimes can appear very lonely. Imagine a castle only with a tenant present. Quite scary it can be. So who should try to move to Chateaus; Students without any partners, inclination to parties and feeling good with people around. A car is a must. Chateaus are outside Fonty. People who like their quiet evening to study should try to avoid since Chateaus are like the center of social life in INSEAD Fonty. Some of the most famous Chateaus are Villecerf, Shangri la and Monte(something). Places can be found by contacting INSEAD and asking for advice. Chateaus are one of the part of INSEAD experience.
The second choice involves moving in Fonty. A nice quiet small and empty city to live there If you have family and you want to be close to School. A real estate agent can help by showing you around ask for advice. I do not know if it is cheaper than chateaus but definitely not such a great experience. Last but not least are big places outside fonty. This option is something between the first and the second bigger places, not so big as chateaus with rooms and with the necessity of a car. These houses are mostly found outside fonty 5 to 10 minutes by car. They are found in really remote places. I once stayed to a place like that. The local baker didn’t have anything to serve by noon. Quite disappointing.
Comparatively speaking it is easier to get a place in FOnty since the demand and supply are stable, I do not see any spike in demand. Fonty is not exactly the hot spot right now. The number of insead admits remain the same so do not be afraid of rent inflation, unlike Singapore.
In Singapore now the situation is different. The property market is hot all over the place. Most students live in Heritage and in Park View. Students live in 3 bedrooms apartments but still the number of people moving to Singapore reduce the number of available apartments. Students now have to live farther away from INSEAD than they used too and still pay crazy prices for it. One example can illustrate what is happening. In 2006 my roommates and I paid X amount for a our place in Heritage. The next group paid X+ 1000SGD while the current is paying X + 2200 SGD. If that is not crazy what is it?
Here I will urge extra caution. Getting a place in Singapore is of the utmost priority. Time is running fast. Find a real estate agent and get a place ASAP. Although according to locals the market will go down since there is no reason for prices to be like that. People in the new promotion have stayed further than normal with some staying in the east side of Singapore.
Most of the action in Singapore happens within student clusters. Try to leave close to some other students so you can organize parties and have some company while you are at it. Barbeques are a weekly phenomenon and one nobody should miss.
In any case find the best you can. The place where you live is a sanctuary and one has to feel comfortable there.

Singapore Digital Marketing 2

I cannot stop thinking about the campaing. Look at previous post(number 5). I feel kinda sorry for the executives.

A singaporean friend wrote to me: "Singapore is trying to hard to be something it is not". True! A first principle of marketing is that perceptions once formulated it takes a lot of hard tries in order to change them. Nobody will be persuaded by this video. yes the campaing may generate buzz(it has in ths blog) but most people will not take it seriously. The executives feel a bit "goofy" in this video.

Remember another marketing axiom, appearances must be supported by the brand's main message. if a claim is coming at cross with the products underlying values then this discrepancy will dilute the claim's strength.

Imagine Michael Jordan advertising on TV Cigaretters or beer! It reeks of being fake right? It doesn't matter if it is or not, but what will the public will think. Ceasar's must not only be honest but also appear to be. Singapore is associated with tidyness, strong goverment but not creativity.

As experience has shown goverments may be good at organising events, or preventing protests(some have made it a habit), but when it comes to perceptions the situation may be more complex. A goverment cannot achieve that target simply by laying out an order. A video with some people in suits singing a tune and appearing so bad at it won't either.

Singapore must understand and practice that some things have to happen on their own. Singaporeans need to become creative and then singapore can claim to be the creative hub it aspires to be. It must be a bottom-up effort not vice versa. Let's see if any1 from their dpeartment will get ahold of this message.

Zani out!

Singapore Digital Marketing

It seems SIngapore is trying to hard to position itself as a digital Marketing Hub! My interactions with Singaporean unfortunately haven:t persuaded that this island is creative. It can be creative when it needs to find uses with its land use and development but regarding content?

THe singaporeans are great at adhering to rules and be efficient. Creativity needs to be fostered. The environment plays a major role. If you burden the people with rules and proper etiquette minds won:t learn how to adapt to a situation where flexibility is required.

A good business environment is not enough and incentives do help but the missing ingredient is: People! People in SIngapore have been brought up in a education system where following the rules and becoming good at science,Math is of the utmost importance.

I remember when we at INSEAD the first day, the singaporeans would Bombard the Dean regarding grades and awards! You have to learn to go out of the box sometimes in order to get a better round view. Videos cannot make up for the missing talent.

By the way this video is a bit over the top! I do not consider it successful. The people who are starring are definetely made to do this, or even if not, they do not seem natural.

Like my colleague at work commented, they are trying really hard to become something they are not.

True!

Basketball diaries @ Singapore the P5s face off the P3s

After countless challenges from the novice P3s we decided(the P5s) to give them a taste of their own medicine!

It took us a period but in the end the P5s managed to gather 5 players. *Author's note: we only had like 50 people available in SIngapore and most of them would be travelling during the weekends so it was quite an accomplishment we managed to get 5 out of the 7 available for basketball!

The record had to be set stragiht since they claimed they had won allready 5 times(a blatant lie)! It was finally time to go down with a last big bang! The last Sunday in SIngapore, the last basketball at INSEAD.

5 lifers in SIngapore against 5 Guys who still had another 4 months at INSEAD.

The game ended and in my mailbox there was a message waiting for me:

Singapore

Sunday June 24^th 2007. 

The P3s won the Insead Basketball Association championship* with a Game Seven victory over rival P5, Sunday night at the

Dover Basketball Court

.  Feeding off the energy of their home fans, who shouted "defense, defense!" throughout the game, P3s surged ahead in the fourth quarter to win*, 81-74, and take the best of seven series, four games to three. 

“It’s always great to win a championship*.  This one’s for the fans!” Eddie Cheung said as he jumped up onto the scorers table to the delight of a sold out crowd. 

The game was not without controversy however.  Some speculate that an out of bounds call on the final play of the game should have gone the other way.

“The ball clearly went off his knee.  Oh well, enjoy the asterisk suckers” commented one P5. 

The championship marks the P3s 5^th Insead title* in the last five years, an amazing feat considering the one year nature of the program.

The Championship Squad includes:

Satoshi Kawase (PG)

Nikhil Malik (SF/SG)

Christophe Zang (C)

Juste Mbamba (PF)

Eddie Cheung (SG)

----

* - The end of game call is currently under review by the IBA.  Street rules contend that a win is not official unless ratified by the opposition.

To set the record straight. First of all the p5s were all there within 10 minutes of the proposed time while the p3s were all present after 30 minutes. Talk about punctuality!

The game was relaxed and not competitive. There was a dubious call during the end when the ball went off Malik's Knee, but he "didn't feel" anything. Afterwards he scored a marvelous 3pointer which sealed the game (with a kiss)!

What was ommited from the email was the second game which was a flashing victory for the P5s by some quick 3pointers(credited to the main P5 star) and a sizzling dunk by Mr. Spider!

basketball on Sundays was a great way to socialize, keep up, excercise and of course have fun here in SIngapore, INSEAD! WHerever i will be in August i will try to use sports as an activity to keep up to date and shape!

One last comment by our point guard: "You know you have been in Singapore too long after you start thinking 100PLUS is great"

Weekends in Singapore => advice to INSEAD people => travelling good for your health and bad for the pocket

I was thinking last night what I did during P4. In P3 it was true that I didn't go out enough in Singapore mostly because of the mood and not enough time, but did I feel this way in P4? I started giong out again in P5 and I asked myself why I wasn't out in P4 with my classmates from P2(a brilliant bunch of guys) and from P4(my own good friends).

The answer is, travelling(another reason why I wasn't blogging). From the end of P3 till even the next weekend most of the times I have been away from Singapore; either for leisure, classess or even work. It is quite funny because I am not the travelling type, I rather enjoy a book and some nice company over lunch on a Sunday afternoon.

In the last 13 weekends( I am counting May's last weekend too) I have been in Singapore only during 2 weekends, basically 1 because i had to stay for 1 weekend to show my parents around. No wonder a lot of my friends tell me where I have been or whether I have moved to Fonty.

Most of these trips are either work related( China ), job (Japan) or leisure ( Hong Kong). I would like to visit more places than recycle old ones. Time though is limited and money can be spen on better things. INSEAD is finishing and I am facing the dillemma whether I should travel more and take advantage of the timing or just socialise more in Singapore with my classmates? Of course these 2 choices don't cancel each one out.

The best part of travelling is I see how the world is changing and how to anticipate these changes. I want to nurture this "soft skill". I do not want to follow trends, I want to set them. This is one of my core strengths and I am investing heavily on it because in the future(even now) it will be in high demand. Having a background in selecting colors for fashion items does help :p

Zanat0s Out

A new roommate enters the appartment of the 3 Amigos

So P5, AK a.k.a. Akshat came back and settled in my previous room. The Lin moved to fonty where he will amaze every1 with is perfect perfomance in everything(except Chess) and Joanne went back to her Mansion. But wait who is the Mysterious 3rd Guy? Where has he come from? What is his agenda? What does he want? What color of shirts does he like?

The new guy is from Wharton is awesome. He has just graduated from Wharton and is here for the cultural exchange. He is cool to hang out with and he is extremely friendly and wellcoming. You can tell that he is from a Top MBA(like INSEAD) by his organization skills.  No wonder he is joining a consulting firm in the States.

The first day i met him I took him for lunch! I am satisfied that he enjoys the feel-good factor, we were talking politics and economics over a foot massage. At night we went out for a drink with another Wharton guy.

He is neat and easy. He has a lot of interests and we share common goals. It is his first time in Asia and i made it my responsibility to show him around and give him the advice he needs.  If Americans are like him, then USA is a cool nation.

It is nice to have somebdoy back in the appartment. in the End of p4 I was home alone! It feels like p1-p2 again when the appartment was lively and all 3 of us would talk about our days.

It is also nice to have AK back. AK is cool in his own way. He is still busy with his staff but we talk more and see each other more frequent now since things are a bit less tense(due to job search).

Wakeboarding, Basketball, movies and pain

it is quite difficult typing lying on your bed with the laptop on top of you. This Weekend offered a lot of opportunities either to relax, study, socialise or excercise. I did all of that.. On saturday morning I treid to organise a brunch, resulitng in total failure. No people turned up, either because they were travelling  or they had to attend a "crack the case seminar" sponsored by BAIN. I enjoyed my saturday brunch reading my books about Alexander the Great.

ON Saturday most INSEAD student either attended the "crack the case" seminar or went wakeboarding. A third group went to Cafe del mar at Sentosa.  I did nothing. I had to meet a business associate for lunch. The lunch lasted more than i expected and i was not in the mood to go to sentosa. I ended up watching a REALLy bad film, Little children. Probably the worst film i saw or I will see in 2007... I was tired and came back home early, around 23.40 for two main reasons! Firstly i needed to finish some papers and read my essay about ALEXANDER THE GREAT. Also on SUnday i would go wakeboarding and i needed to wake up ealry.

Sunday was the day when i went wakeboarding for the first time. 15 INSEAD students ended up in a "resort". The weather was fantastic and we wakeboarded(almost for me). I was the first one to leave around 16.00! There was my sunday ritual and i wasn't willing to skip it. The 18.00 basketball game. I played Bball with my swimming trunks, an event that was a bit strange.... This time at Dover we had some guests and more players than usual. I played yesterday 6 games. Yes 6 games non stop. Glad to say that i did a good job and I contributed to my team's wins. Yeah David Ratner and Charles Lin were again the domineering factors but I did my part. At 20.10 the games were over. Boy was I in for a surprise.  The andreline didn't let me realise in what shape I was. At 21:00 i reached vivocity with Johan Hellman in order to catch a movie in the GOLD CLASS screen. What is GOld Class?

It is a premium service where you get charged more or less 15 euros, you get a nice relaxing couch and your own private servant. There is also premium-priced food... In the end the movie costs you more or less 25 euros, quite a high price for 2 hours of watching a film.

Next morning i find myself unable to get out of bed, or if i do that it causes me a lot of pain. I have only ine class and i decided to skip class today. Health is more important.

Updates @ INSEAD, Videos and timetable, Celebrate 7500th Visitor, And E-NOMINE

FOr those of you who have already been to INSEAD or are already here telling how busy P3 is will not come as a surprise to you. Time is not enough. prjects, classes, meetings, job hunting, socialising, Gym and blogging takes its toll on everybody's life.

Quite some people are congratulating me for my work( even from INSEAD). It seems Brutal Facts is gathering traction (1000 Visitors in just 8 days). But my to-do list is growing so much that i started writing down on a piece of paper what i should do in the folowing day even on my blog. The post list until now contains the following issues

1. Brazilian BBQ
2. The 10 Party
3. Traffic Lights day @ INSEAD
4. Singapore and Fonty lifers and the value of the INSEAD MBA
5. Results of our meeting @ SPSD
6. ANother post ofr the SPSD class we had about IDEO
7. The Politics Session and the IT exam
8. The need to value a country's culture and not be money oriented( a debate I had with a HK person who disagrees)
9. The Average profile of an INSEAD(er).
10. Last But not least...........  I would like to thank some people who are of a big help to me here @ Singapore and they deserve attention.

10 Posts.... I hope I wil catch up on the weekend. As a consolation prize I have here a video of E-NOMINE schwarze Sonne. My fave group, another song, another Video clip. I won't say how much I like E-nomine.... THis is self-explanatory but I will point your attention to the guy in the Video.... He has played in some movies and TV series. He was Conan.....

INEAD: Basketball world tournament and other incidents

so like i promised let me give an explanation of what happenned yesterday. In P3 we have 3 core courses. one of them is IT, most people exempt since they have IT backgrounds. I didn't. IT has to do with the business applications that companies use and how they implement change in the IT department.
As far as I am concerned yesterday @ class i wanted to ask a question. I wanted to ask what do managers have to lose when they insist on a failed project that drains money? My point was that if they pull the plug probably they will also lose their job, if they don't they may have a slight chance of turning it around and saving the company...
But the teacher, another Greek, preempted me by telling me NOT to ask him about something( I don't remember what he said exaclty). I got confused. suddendly my mind wanted me to ask him about that, the thing he told me NOT to ask... I was dumbfounded. I was speechless. I tried to formulate my question but i failed miserably... In the end it got really funny since every1 in the class starting lauging. I felt stupid and i said "jesu man wht did u do to me?" I was so confused. Asked not ask something and was made to forget what i really wanted to ask...